Free Crooked Wreath by Christianna Brand

disclaimed, Bella caught at his sleeve. “For God’s sake, Philip, what’s happened? Is it Richard? Is he ill? Has he had another attack?” At sight of his face she went, if possible, more white than she had been before, and cried, with a sort of desperate comprehension: “He’s dead! You’re trying to tell me that Richard’s dead!”
    â€œYes,” said Philip, “he’s dead. And all that coramine has disappeared from my bag; and a hypodermic and a phial of strychnine …” He stood, also ashy white, looking back at them in doubt and terror as though astounded by the implications of what was before them all, and suddenly blurted out: “I believe somebody’s killed him,” and so pushed open the door and led the way abruptly into the drawing-room.
    In the centre of the floor, where Claire had left it last night, was a pool of spilt water, a mass of broken glass, and a heap of dead flowers; and above Serafita’s portrait, the wreath of roses was hanging askew again.

6
    I NSPECTOR C OCKRILL was at the house before midday. Small, brown, and bright-eyed, a dusty little old sparrow arrayed in a startlingly clean white panama hat, he was soon, sparrowlike, at the centre of all interest and activity, hopping and darting this way and that, in search of crumbs of information. Stephen Garde, summoned by a tearful Peta craving sympathy and support, had insisted upon his being sent for. “Since you know Cockie personally, Lady March, why not get him over and ask his advice? If there’s nothing wrong, you can be sure he won’t make any fuss; on the other hand, if there is–well, you’ll all be in a very bad position if you’ve made things more difficult for the police.” He had stood there, cold and quiet all of a sudden; such a little man with his childish, fair curly hair, to be steadily opposing the united will of people whom he knew and loved, who should surely, thought Peta resentfully, have been his first, his only, thought.… “I am thinking of you, it’s absolutely for your sakes that I suggest it. You’ll be putting yourselves hopelessly in the wrong if you just go ahead as though there was no question of Sir Richard’s having–having died a normal death. Well, yes, Philip, we all hope it was normal, and I quite agree that the disappearance of this coramine and strychnine or whatever it was, doesn’t necessarily mean that–that there was anything wrong. But with the draft of the will missing–because Briggs definitely handed it in to Sir Richard last night–well, the whole thing looks jolly unsatisfactory to say the least of it, and I simply can’t advise you just to let things go.”
    Peta gazed at his stern face, white and trembling. “Can’t you forget for a moment that you’re our lawyer, Stephen? Don’t be so–so beastly pomp ous!”
    â€œIt’s for your own sakes,” repeated Stephen, doggedly. “Anyway, I very much doubt that the doctor will give a certificate, so it’s all bound to come out.” He had gone straight down to the lodge and there waited quietly for Cockrill to arrive, allowing nobody to come nearer than the rose beds and the sanded paths. “All right, if I’m fussing, I’m fussing: Cockrill will decide all that.” Apologetic but indomitable, he had fought them all off till the Inspector arrived. When Cockrill, having glanced over the lodge and alloted tasks to his various henchmen, summoned the family to the drawing-room at the house, Stephen asked, diffidently: “Can I come along and watch your third-degree methods, on behalf of Lady March?” and without reference to anyone else, perched himself, swinging his short legs, on a table outside the circle and tried to convince himself that Peta would ever speak to him again, and doubted it.
    Edward sat in a big armchair, very still and frightened.